Judge Strikes Down Oklahoma Ban on Same-Sex Marriage

Married partners Gay Phillips (with Pride flag) and Sue Barton, along with unmarried partners Sharon Baldwin and Mary Bishop, pictured at a June panel discussion, brought the suits that were upheld Tuesday.Michael Wyke / Tulsa World

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Jan. 14, 2014, 11:29 PM GMT / Updated Jan. 15, 2014, 12:19 AM GMT

Oklahoma's ban on same-sex marriage was struck down Tuesday by a federal judge who declared it a fundamental violation of equal rights.

U.S. Senior District Judge Terence Kern ruled in Tulsa that a state constitutional amendment limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples ran afoul of the U.S. Constitution's guarantee of equal protection under the 14th Amendment.

But Chad Griffin, president of the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights activist group, said it was clear that Kern "has come to the conclusion that so many have before him — that the fundamental equality of lesbian and gay couples is guaranteed by the United States Constitution."

One of the two couples who brought the case has been "in a loving, committed relationships for many years," Kern wrote in a 68-page opinion. "They own property together, wish to retire together, wish to make medical decisions for one another, and wish to be recognized as a married couple with all its attendant rights and responsibilities."

But they are excluded from marriage, he wrote, "without a legally sufficient justification."

"Equal protection is at the very heart of our legal system and central to our consent to be governed. It is not a scarce commodity to be meted out begrudgingly or in short portions." - U.S. Senior District Judge Terence Kern

Kern called Oklahoma's ban "an arbitrary, irrational exclusion of just one class of Oklahoma citizens from a governmental benefit," declaring:

"Equal protection is at the very heart of our legal system and central to our consent to be governed. It is not a scarce commodity to be meted out begrudgingly or in short portions."

The case involves two couples — Mary Bishop and Sharon Baldwin, and Gay Phillips and Susan Barton — who challenged Oklahoma's ban in 2004 in a lawsuit that also challenged the federal Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA. A trial had been scheduled for May 2012, but it was put on hold while other same-sex marriage worked their way through the federal courts.

Kern ruled only on the part of the suit addressing the Oklahoma state constitution, noting that the key provision of DOMA has already been declared unconstitutional.